dBA checking in...
Hope you have been well. Have you looked at your
changes? What small changes have you committed to make over the next couple of
weeks?
Keeping one or two changes in focus creates a
manageable goal situation. Lots of facets make up the beautiful machine that is
the human body and it is the complex interaction of each, that makes it
function optimally. So start small and you will be surprised at the size of the
improvements achieved throughout the machine. For me, in the next couple of
weeks I am going to work on sleeping habits. In the hectic world that we
live in, this seems to be an area that is difficult to get right and by
extension can cripple the success of your fitness strategy.
There is a wealth of information swimming around
the web on sleep and sleep deprivation, especially as it relates to health and
exercise performance. Yet, many of us, still take sleep for granted and 'teach'
ourselves to survive in a sleep-deprived state. If you view the process of
sleep as a body reset, then to get a fully functional reset, recommended values
of sleep exceed 6-hours. This facilitates all hormones and natural body
chemical levels to return to start and prepare for the work of the day ahead.
Not allowing this process to be complete throws it all out of balance.
One such hormone is the stress-induced cortisol,
which preserves our friend - "carbs" in storage as muscle glycogen
for later use. Sleep deprivation is perceived as a stressful state by the body,
as most times it is and when its not it leads to it anyway. Now the intention
of cortisol is good, but most times, the sleep-deprived state facilitates the
excess production of the substance. Yes, there is that word excess again. By
means not the only side effect of sleep deprivation, as it is also linked to
mood state, ability to focus and generally be productive, but cortisol, makes a
very easy case for improving your sleep numbers: quantity and quality.
What can you do? Well, there is that first line in
the chapter on sleeping habits from the Book of the Obvious: try to
achieve the recommended sleep dosage over an extended period of time. One week
of good sleep is not going to repair weeks, months or dare I say years of bad
habits. Keep a log on how you felt on waking up and how the sleep itself felt
(egs: "restful"; "tossed a lot"; "was out cold").
There are apps such as Smart Alarm, devices such as Sleep Zeo or the FitBit
Activity/Sleep Tracker and websites such as the BBC that help create profiles
and logging process. See the following links:
Please note I have not been in contact with any of
the above companies on advertising their products in anyway. I am merely
sharing things that I have come across in my search to improve my fitness, my
performance as a weekend warrior and then improve the advice on to my clients
as well. Feel free to share any experiences or successes with sleep monitoring
by commenting on the blog.
As I glance down and see the time, I realize, yet
again, I have gotten the sleep thing wrong if I am to make my quota, but it is
a process and it will take some work. Till next time I leave you with this
one..
“One of the most important keys to
Success is having the discipline to do what you know you should do, even when
you don’t feel like doing it.” - Unknown
